June 13-19; This Is Why You're No Einstein Either, Sweetie

By HUBERT B. HERRING

Published: June 20, 1999

Grim scientists hunched over a dissected brain, calipers in hand -- it's a sepia-toned, 19th-century sort of image. Or something from a bizarre corner of 1950's science fiction.

But phrenology, of sorts, has once again reared its woolly head. Thankfully, it has been combined with neuroscience.

Feeling the need to fit genius into a neat little box, the world has long figured that the brain of one Albert Einstein, certified genius, surely held some clue to that mystery of mysteries. Einstein himself wanted his brain studied after his death. The mathematician died in 1955 at the age of 76.

So in pursuit of that holy grail of a clue, scientists have subjected Einsteinian gray matter to all manner of indignities -- photographing it, measuring it, slicing it into 240 pieces and lugging it to and fro in jars and cardboard boxes.

And now, more than 40 years after the brain was removed in an autopsy, scientists in Canada, who received specimens in 1996, have reported their findings in the medical journal The Lancet.

A critical region of Einstein's brain -- the inferior parietal lobe, which processes mathematical thought, three-dimensional visualization and spatial relationships -- is notably larger than those of more plodding mortals, the scientists found.

If this is indeed a clue to Einstein's mental power, it could well prove a crucial research tool. But given the way humanity has taken to tinkering with itself, it also conjures more bizarre possibilities.